I’d been avoiding Iron Man 3 figures pretty much since they came out. Since they seemed to be lacking most of what I’d liked about the Iron Man 2 line, they were a pretty easy pass.

I had picked up something in passing, War Machine was only available in the “Assemblers” version, the larger interchangeable limbs packed figures. He also seemed to be one of the short packed figures in that series. So when Wally World dropped the price $2, I figured I’d grab WM.

Appearance:

I haven’t seen the film as of this writing, so maybe there’s more than one version. I doubt it though. This one seems a bit off from what I can tell from most of the images I found online.

Stylistically, he looks fairly similar to the film version. However, the devil is in the details. While the new film suit is a bit sleeker than the old armor, this one makes it look even more polished since there’s quite a bit of detail missing.

With the Iron Man 2 line, there was a fair amount of effort put into making the armor look like plates and panels. Here you get more of an impression of that detail than the actual detail.

This is most obvious in the plates covering his midsection. They don’t follow the design of the movie armor at all. And on top of that, they are painted incorrectly, the movie version has an all silver abdomen, where this is striped.

Speaking of paint there are some other errors as well. The two panels on his shoulders are not there in the film. Something that is in the film that is missing are his military number markings. That is part of what made the figure from the last film stand out, and it really would have added something.

There’s more non-existent paint. If you hold the package in the store you can see all of it. On his back there is none. Nada. I’d complained of this on Star Wars figures before, but here there is absolutely none on the back of the figure.

Right below the upper chest panel there is an odd indent. It looks too deep to me like it’s a latch or something. Of course this indent is offset by the fact his arc reactor light seems to stand proud rather than be inset.

While more of an accessory, the cannon that makes an armored figure stand out as War Machine is a let down for sure. It’s too small for starters, but the lack of detail on the front really doesn’t give you sense that it is a weapon.

To attach it, the piece pegs into a hole in the middle of his back. Due to the design, this makes it cocked funny over his should instead of being flat. It almost looks like a strange puppet over his shoulder. But hey, the pegs on it let it be placed into the huge holes on his forearms and legs!

Fun:

There was something I was pleasantly surprised by on this figure. The woefully small shoulder armor pieces have an extra joint in them. While it doesn’t help much, any extra articulation on this figure is a bonus.

The main gimmick here is they’ve taking the mix and match idea from the cards on the Iron Man 2 line and put it in the figures. It was “meh” with the cards. It’s “meh” here. Even as a kid, I don’t think this would have appealed to me. Sure, I had extra arms and legs for Steve Austin. But I actually preferred the plain one.

In the the pack are separate legs and two sets of arms. Why are the legs separate? Without an extra set, you don’t really need this. They also limit the motion to that of a vintage Star Wars figure. The left one was a bit hard to pop on. If you were a kid and playing with these, I’m not sure how much wear and tear they will hold up to.

The arms I don’t get either. One turns his left arm into a spring loaded cannon. I don’t see War Machine as the Bioshock Big Daddy type. That same left arm has a peg on the bottom so you can attach it to his legs or other arms. I almost wonder if it was going to split at the elbow at some point and be a loose gun.

The right arm you ask? It looks like something out of an over armored 90’s comic. I don’t like it and don’t see ever using it in a display, except maybe in Jawa parts bin.

Overall:

Yep. This figure was exactly what I thought it would be. I really am not sure why they would have strayed from the fairly successful Iron Man 2 line. That line got a number of folks like me to pick up Marvel figures we normally wouldn’t have.

Honestly, I was happier with it until I saw it next to screen caps. Standing him next to the other versions of War Machine didn’t help either.

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